The lawyer for brothers Andrew and Tristan Tate claimed the controversial social media influencers are victims of a “political witch hunt” and vowed to fight their extradition to the UK to face rape and sex trafficking charges.
Speaking outside a court in Miami, Joe McBride argued his clients were being “attacked for what they say, not what they’ve done” and branded Britain “a fallen state that prosecutes its citizens for free speech”.
He appeared to reference the case of a woman being arrested for praying outside an abortion clinic, while also claiming political activist Tommy Robinson had been targeted “simply for exercising his free speech rights”.
Mr McBride also raised the possibility of US President Donald Trump intervening in the extradition proceedings, arguing “he was elected to fight against this kind of nonsense”.
The Tate brothers, who hold dual US and British citizenship, were arrested by US marshals at the weekend and were due in court on Monday.
They were detained after more charges were brought against them by the British authorities.
Andrew Tate, 39, was charged with seven further counts of rape, three counts of arranging or facilitating trafficking for sexual exploitation, three counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and 19 additional charges for offences relating to indecent images of a child and extreme pornography.
Tristan Tate, 38, was charged with one count of sexual assault, two counts of rape and three counts of arranging or facilitating trafficking for sexual exploitation.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said the 38 additional charges, in addition to 21 existing charges, relate to alleged offences between July 2010 and August 2017.
The brothers have previously denied any wrongdoing.
Mr McBride said: “We of course are going to fight extradition.”
Describing the further charges as “salacious and defamatory”, he said: “Some of them are despicable, meritless, heinous and atrocious. They’re designed to poison the jury pool, to re-poison public consciousness.”
Mr McBride added: “We’ve never seen a scintilla of evidence that indicates that these guys are guilty of anything. They’re being punished and attacked for what they say, not what they’ve done.
“You can love them, you can hate them, but nobody should go to jail for free speech, and that is exactly what this is about.
“Make no mistake about it, the United Kingdom was once the greatest empire the world has ever known. It is a fallen nation. It is a fallen state that prosecutes its citizens for free speech.”
He went on: “That is not what democracies and free societies do. That is what communist China and despotic regimes do. And we’re going to fight them at every turn, at every corner, because they are American citizens.”
Mr McBride argued US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and others in the administration “are not fans of communism”.
He said: “They’re not fans of prosecuting people for free speech. This is one of the reasons why they’ve been elected.
“So I would just think, as a matter of principle, based on the reasons why they were elected, that they would not want to see two free citizens go to a country where they’re going to be thrown in jail for political reasons.”
He added: “I can’t comment directly on what my president is going to do. All I can say is he was elected to fight against this kind of nonsense, and I can’t see him looking at this with an objective lens and agreeing to a political witch hunt and a political kidnapping.”
Mr McBride expected the legal proceedings process to take around 60 days.
He said: “Could be a little longer. It could be a little shorter, depending on how it shakes out for us. But I think for the foreseeable future, we’re in this for the next two months.”
